The friendly, neighborhood weblog written for the unusual by the unusual. I am your host, Lightning Man.
Here we'll discuss my journey as a recovering adult child of an alcoholic, as well as politics, popular culture, American sports, and pulchritudinous females.

Thursday, January 05, 2012

Things I learned while looking up other things

Back when I was a kid, one of the columnists in the local newspaper was Sydney J. Harris, who I normally didn't read. However, usually on a Saturday if I remember correctly, he would do a column he would title "Things I Learned While Looking Up Other Things." I found the idea that you could learn something else while trying to learn a different thing interesting and I found the tidbits he ran into interesting myself.

As I go to write every day, I too find myself learning things on the way to finding information on what I want to write about, and so, here is my blatant rip off of Sydney J. Jarris.

Alcoholics Anonymous was founded in Akron, Ohio. Bill W., one of the co-founders of AA, was in Akron and felt like drinking and met with another alcoholic who quit instead. I don't believe the mere sight of Akron causes you to want to drink, BTW.

The fleshy, tasty part of a pomegranate seed is called the aril. I also learned after eating a poemgranate for the first time that the red juice flies everywhere.

If a stock sells for under a dollar a share for several days in a row, the stock gets delisted from the major exchanges and has to be sold on the Pink Sheets or the OTC Bulletin Board. These are the stock exchanges for what is generally called penny stocks. A certain famous airline had this happen to them recently. Coincidentally, it was the one I flew to meet Kathy.

A cribbage board belonging originally to Rear Admiral Richard O'Kane is always housed on the longest serving active duty submarine in the US Fleet. What I did not learn was "Why?"